July 2010 Under Construction

1972 Vega Notchback
Budget Racer
Jeff Schwartz, owner of Schwartz Performance, is kind of a nut. While his contemporaries were stuck behind their seventh-grade desks, daydreaming about ice cream trucks and summer freedoms, Jeff was longing to improve his welding skills. He got an early start in the fabrication world, and it's paid off. Now he is not just owner, but fabricator at his own shop where he helps others fulfill their vehicular dreams.

1/9

In his profession, if you're successful, opportunities to tinker on your own projects come frequently. In a perfect world, budgets are endless. It's not a perfect world, however, and Jeff wanted to build a car that was low on budget but high on performance. Jeff obtained this 1972 Vega notchback after watching it get tossed between friends for 10 years. Jeff had enough, and offered the one with the hot potato $1,500 for the engineless car.

With a $5,000 budget in mind, he began with a quick scuff-and-shoot paintjob. The front sheetmetal was missing, so Jeff collected new panels and painted them this brown metallic by PPG. The Vega had 44,000 original miles with a remarkably intact interior that didn't require any repairs. Jeff sourced some extra-narrow seats to fit between the Vega's stock interior panels, and covered the rear seats to match.

2/9

Jeff is a pretty resourceful guy, which is very important when you're trying to save a couple bucks. A junkyard S-10 donor was used for its five-lug hubs, brakes, and spindles, as well as the entire rear axle and brake assembly. Jeff cut off the housing's brackets and welded on the Vega's; the fit was perfect.

The point of this build was to demonstrate how cool a car can be with a budget, and to run it at Goodguy's autocross events. Jeff loves the high-dollar cars as much as everyone else, but he knows firsthand how great it can be to build a car to enjoy even when times are tough.

3/9

By The Numbers

1972 VEGA NOTCHBACK

Jeff Schwartz, 41 • Woodstock, IL

Performance: 400 hp

ENGINE

Type:

Chevy LS 5.3 HO

Block:

aluminum

Oiling:

factory

Rotating assembly:

factory

Cylinder heads:

factory

Camshaft:

LS7 GM

Valvetrain:

Patriot gold springs

Induction:

LS1

Ignition:

MSD coil-on-plug

Cooling:

Be Cool radiator

Fuel system:

Holley fuel pump,

Aeromotive regulator and rails

Exhaust:

Schwartz Performance custom

Fasteners:

ARP

DRIVETRAIN

Transmission/shifter:

TH350,

10-inch B&M Holeshot converter

Driveshaft:

Schwartz custom

Rear axle:

S-10 8.5-inch GM 10-bolt

CHASSIS

Front suspension:

Addco sway bar,

Flaming River quick-ratio steering box

Rear suspension:

Addco sway bar

Brakes:

S-10 four-wheel disc

BODY/PAINT

Paint:

scuff-and-shoot PPG

WHEELS/TIRES

Wheels:

Superlite, 15x7 and 15x8

Tires:

225/50R15 BFGoodrich G-Force Sport

1965 Chevy Corvette
Vintage Racer
For a long time, only cars that had historical racing history were allowed to drive at historic events like the Monterey Historics. The truth is that there just aren't a lot of them left. Recently, the sanctioning bodies have lifted this requirement to allow all vintage cars to run with the historical cars as long as they follow the same rules.

4/9

Group 6 of these races include muscle cars from 1963 to 1973. Can you imagine playing in the field of Camaros, Mustangs, Challengers, and Corvettes, running wheel to wheel with some of the greatest cars in history? Brent Jarvis, owner of Performance Restorations, really wanted to join the fun. Rather than investing in a historical car, he would have way more fun building a vintage road race car of his own.

Running Performance Restorations for almost 30 years now has given him more than enough experience building cars, and Corvettes were his specialty. A buddy of his was big into racing Corvettes and brought a '65 hard top to build up. He got preoccupied with a new addition to his family, a Z06, and he sold the car to Brent knowing it was going to a good home. It was a matching-numbers 427 big-block car with a four-speed-perfect for the series.

5/9

The class keeps a lot of the variables locked down, using many factory components. The trained race car builder knows how to manipulate the areas to create the best handling car the rules can tolerate. Things like sway bars and tie rods were up to Brent's imagination, so he built a custom splined sway bar and replaced the ball-joint tie-rod ends with spherical rod ends and shimmed them to eliminate bumpsteer. Despite the rule of stock-mounted control arms, Brent managed 3 degrees of negative camber and 5 degrees positive caster to really help the car stick. "I've never driven a car with bias-ply tires before. That should be interesting," Brent says. He's curious to see how the '60s technology-backed by brute power-stacks up against the Pro Touring style cars he's used to building and driving.

6/9

By The Numbers

1965 CORVETTE

Brent Jarvis • Mundelein, IL

Performance: 705 hp at 7,200 rpm

ENGINE

Type:

427ci big-block Chevy

Block:

'69 four-bolt

Oiling:

Moroso pan and pump

Rotating assembly:

GM forged crank,

billet I-beam rods,

Mahle forged 12.5:1 pistons

Cylinder heads:

ported and flowed

AFR aluminum rectangular

Camshaft:

Erson solid roller,

.731-inch lift,

276/284 degrees duration

Valvetrain:

lightweight roller lifters,

T&D shaft rockers,

2.25/1.88-inch Ferrea gun-drilled valves

Induction:

Edelbrock Performer dual-plane

(as per rules) radically ported,

Pro Systems 1,050-cfm 4150-style carb

Ignition:

MSD

Cooling:

Be Cool aluminum radiator

with dual fans

Exhaust:

Stahl 21/8-inch side-exit headers,

4-inch tubing

Fasteners:

ARP

DRIVETRAIN

Transmission/shifter:

highly modified

close-ratio Super T10

Driveshaft:

aluminum

Rear axle:

Tom's Differentials billet axles,

3.23 gears

CHASSIS

Front suspension:

relocated stock

control arms, metal bushings,

QA1 double-adjustable shocks,

600-pound springs,

1¼-inch splined adjustable sway bar

Rear suspension:

boxed and reinforced

swing arms, spherical bushings,

1-inch adjustable sway bar,

composite leaf spring,

QA1 double-adjustable shocks

Brakes:

Coleman heat-treated

11.75-inch rotors on aluminum hats,

dual master cylinders with

a fluid recycling system

PAINT/BODY

Paint:

PPG Nassau Blue with white stripe

Body:

stretched fenders,

1-inch at the body line (as per the rules),

custom "number 9" Penske-Sonoco

'66 Corvette hood look-alike

WHEELS/TIRES

Wheels:

ET 15x8 front, 15x8.5 five spokes rear

Tires:

Goodyear Blue Streak bias ply

1967 Chevy Chevelle
1:1 Scale Model
When you're too small to build cars of your own, 1:25 scale versions are a good place to start. Jeff Lawrence of Laguna Hills, California, didn't have a car in the family to tinker on. He was left to use his imagination on plastic models until he was old enough to buy a car. He loved the Tri-Five cars, and dreamed of a '57 Nomad, but high school budgets allowed him a '55 Bel Air instead. By the time he was 16, it was in car show condition, and he took it to every show he could get to. Fixing up a car and parading it around really made him happy; he knew that would be part of his life forever.

7/9

After high school, Jeff got a job at a machine shop, but realized his aspirations of working for a major commercial airplane company couldn't be put on hold any longer, and he went to school for his degree in electronics engineering and got his FAA licenses. He now works in the quality engineering and special project divisions at Boeing. Jeff told PHR: "Planes are like huge powerful cars that can fly. What's not to like?"

8/9

Since the '55, he's had a couple cars over the years, but his career limited the amount of time he could dedicate to building them. A couple years ago he picked up this Virginia-based '67 Chevelle convertible he found listed on the Team Chevelle forum. He set out to look for a place he could hand the shell over to for the body and paintwork, since he doesn't have the time or place to do that part. He was referred to Best of Show Coachworks in San Marcos, California, for the job. Jeff prides himself on being a hands-on guy, so he's building the chassis and engine at home while the body and paint gets done at the shop. Jeff's wife is still getting used to why there is car trim being stored in the living room.